


Keeping Secrets

by Novels



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Mild Language, Mild Mystrade, Post-Reichenbach, Return fic, Sherlock Being Sherlock, Sherlock Mini-Bang, a bit of angst, keeping secrets, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-30
Updated: 2013-12-30
Packaged: 2018-01-06 18:31:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1110160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Novels/pseuds/Novels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock likes to play with other people's lives, especially if he has a chance to mess with his brother's one.<br/>Who cares if D.I. Lestrade almost loses his mind trying to help him without Mycroft finding out?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Keeping Secrets

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for the [Sherlock mini-bang](http://sherlockminibang.tumblr.com/) and all the pictures you'll find embedded in it have been drawn by [Thatsketch ](http://thatsketch.tumblr.com/) as part of the challenge itself.  
> I could not have wished for a better partner; this was my first fic ever in this fandom -not to mention the first I dared writing in English - and she has been the most supportive and helpful person I've had the pleasure to work with.  
> She is also the one who betaed the story and survived the task, so a big thank you is totally deserved.  
> All the remaining mistakes are my own.
> 
> All the characters belong to the BBC, Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat, as well as to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  
> All the drawings belong to Thatsketch.
> 
> No copyright infringement intended.

Mycroft was staring at the telephone on his desk without really seeing it. It had been years since he last felt that tight knot in his stomach, that awful pressure against his throat. It was overwhelming, annihilating. He could not focus on anything else, could not distract himself in any way. He found himself praying for his brother to do the trick, for that telephone not to ring. Everything was ready – of course, he had to consider all the possible outcomes and plan a damage control strategy for each of them. However, even he could not make miracles. If Sherlock failed and that phone rang, more than one life was going to be shattered to pieces. Sherlock’s first of all. John Watson’s, Gregory’s. _His_ Gregory’s.

His eyes were burning and Mycroft finally blinked.

The phone rang.

He waited for a heartbeat, his eyes still closed, than he straightened his shoulders and picked up.

«Damage control five,» Sherlock said. «Moriarty is dead. I am sorry.»

His brother’s voice had an edge that he had never heard before. Mycroft hung the receiver without saying a word. He pushed the button on the interphone and spoke to his PA. «Damage control strategy five, Anthea. Now.» He released the switch and collapsed against the backrest of his leather chair. After a few seconds, he hid his face in his hands.

* * *

 

Detective Inspector Lestrade was pacing in his office, feeling like a tiger in a cage. He desperately wanted to do something, anything, to get Sherlock and John out of that absurd situation, but his hands were tied. The Superintendent had been perfectly clear: he had made more than enough to discredit the Met and he was supposed – no, _compelled_ – not to be involved anymore in anything related to Sherlock Holmes.

Greg swore between his teeth and stopped at the window, looking out to the street below his office.

The noise of high heels approaching made him turn around just in time to see Donovan enter in a rush.

Her expression stopped him from uttering whatever insult came to his mind.

«What happened?»

Donovan looked completely lost. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out of it.

«Sally, what happened?» He pressured.

She looked away. «Sherlock…» her voice faltered.

Lestrade walked around his desk and stopped right in front of her. «What’s the matter with him, Sally?»

She looked away, taking a deep breath and steadying herself. «Sherlock’s dead.»

He blinked. «What?»

Sally could not meet his eyes. She kept hers fixed on his hideous carpet as if her life depended on it. «He jumped from St. Bart’s rooftop. He killed himself.»

Greg stepped back until he bumped into his desk. He could not believe it. He _would_ not believe it.

Sherlock would never have done something like that. It had to be some sort of joke. A disgusting one, too.

Sally opened her mouth again. Her lower lip was trembling. «I’m sor--»

He didn’t stay in his office long enough to hear her finish the sentence. He stormed out of it, unable to bear her voice cracking. She didn’t have the right to be upset. She was the one who made it all happen. He didn’t stop walking until he reached the open air. He breathed deeply, trying to calm himself.

Reality dawned on him. Sherlock was gone. He had left all of them behind.

He took his phone from his pocket, staring at it for a while. He took a steadying breath, then he dialled the number.

«Gregory.» Only his name. No inflection, no emotion. Gregory let his breath out, barely noticing he had been keeping it.

«Mycroft.» He didn’t manage to hide his emotions as well as his partner did. His voice trembled on the last syllable. He had to stop for a couple of seconds. «Why?» he murmured. «Why did he have to do it?»

He heard a sigh on the other end of the call. It was a trembling one. «We’ll never know.» And the pain that filtered from that few words was enough to make him ache in his chest.

* * *

 

Mycroft was sitting in one of the two armchairs that stood in front of the fireplace, back in his office on the second floor of his old town house, looking intently at the bright flames that painted his face in an orange shade, highlighting his long nose and furrowed brows. He was cuddling in his hand a heavy tumbler half-full of Scotch, stirring it absentmindedly with a circular movement of his wrist while his mind replayed his short conversation with Gregory for the fifty-seventh time.

Suddenly, he stopped the almost unconscious movement and spoke to the supposedly empty, dark room, his eyes still fixed on the fire, unfocused.

«Your room is ready, brother dear,» he said. «Feel free to hide there for as long as you deem necessary.» There was no inflection in his voice, not pity or happiness; even the usual mocking tone was gone. Mycroft seemed to have been utterly, definitely emptied of any feelings.

The shadows in the furthest corner of the room stirred and a black figure moved to sit down in the second armchair without the faintest noise. The two men stared at the flames in silence for various minutes.

«It could have gone worse,» stated Sherlock, avoiding a direct answer to his brother’s affirmation.

Mycroft let out a brief, scornful laugh. «Certainly. You could be dead for real.» Again, Sherlock avoided reacting to his brother’s words.

The eldest Holmes sighed and turned to finally look at him. «Are you sure it will be worth it?»

Sherlock closed his eyes briefly, joining his hands by the palms and bringing them in front of his mouth, then nodded. «It will be.»

Mycroft stared at him intently, as if assessing his brother’s confidence, then turned to face the fireplace again. «You will leave in two days, then. You will find that everything has been arranged as you instructed.» He stood, placing his unfinished drink on the small coffee table between the two armchairs, and walked a few steps towards the door before stopping, his hand already on the handle. «And Sherlock,» he said, letting his mask falter for just a second, «thank you.»

* * *

 

_One year later_   

 

Detective Inspector Lestrade was sitting in his old leather sofa watching a totally uninteresting documentary on the birth of the solar system when the wooden floor board in the hall creaked. He stilled, his senses alerted, and he waited for any other evidences that there was an intruder in his home, but the flat remained absolutely silent, except for the dull voice coming from the television. After a few minutes, he relaxed back against the soft pillows and focused on the documentary.

_“...mutual gravity caused these rocks to come together; eventually, to form planets. These planets revolved around the Sun.”_

«Boring.»

Lestrade froze, more or less like Pluto, which was now glowing on the screen without being actually seen.

“I’m going mad,” he thought, closing his eyes forcefully and squeezing them. He shook his head in denial, then opened them again. The blue ball was still rotating smoothly on the telly, but Lestrade was now staring at the black silhouette reflected on the screen.

Slowly, he turned towards the back of the room, taking in the man who was standing in the threshold. Lestrade opened his mouth, possibly to say something, and found himself speechless. He stared at a man who he deemed dead while he walked to the armchair next to the sofa, with his hands behind his back, and sat down graciously, his dark coat waving smoothly with every step he made.

Sherlock’s eyes scanned the room, assessing his surroundings, and came to a stop on the telly.

His nose wrinkled with scorn. There was a small bruise on it. Lestrade could not take his eyes off of it.

«Shut it down, will you, Lestrade?» he said, nodding towards the telly as if he was offended by its sheer existence.

Lestrade ignored him. «You’re alive,» he said, a little breathless.

«Astute observation, Detective Inspector. Now, will you shut down that awful device of yours? I need to speak with you.»

Lestrade obeyed, still staring at Sherlock in disbelief. He was thankful to be sitting in his sofa, because he was feeling just a little bit overwhelmed.

«Where have you been? How _the hell_ did you survive?»

«Irrelevant,» answered Sherlock with a dismissive gesture.

«Irrelevant?» repeated Lestrade with an incredulous tone.

«Yes, as I’ve just said, _irrelevant_. I need you to help me, Lestrade. I don’t have time to do it, but I need my name cleared for when I come back.»

Lestrade gaped at him. «What do you mean ‘when I come back’? You are back right now.»

«No, I am not.» Sherlock’s eyes pinned him to the sofa, icy and determined. «The only reason I came back to London is that I realized I will not have the time to reinstate my name while I’m off doing what I’m doing and I needed you to know what you have to do.»

«What I have to--» Lestrade mouthed the words to himself. «And what exactly _is_ that you are off doing?» he suddenly asked.

«Nothing in which you are concerned. Now, listen to me attentively. I need you to go through my old cases, the ones in which we worked together, and find evidence that the crimes and their solutions were real. You have to prove that I was not the one who faked. You have to prove _I_ was real.»

Lestrade stared at him with an assessing look.

«Does John know you are alive?» he asked in a challenging tone.

Sherlock’s glare gave him chills.

«No, and he doesn’t have to know. Am I being clear, Detective Inspector? John must not know I am alive. Nobody must, or everything I did will be in vain. It is of the utmost importance.»

Lestrade sighed. «Why?»

«There are lives at stake, Detective Inspector. Yours, too. I am endangering you just by being here at this moment, but it could not be avoided.» 

Lestrade stiffened, but tried to conceal it.

«Will you do it? Will you help me, Detective Inspector?»

Greg closed his eyes in resignation. «Yes, God help me, yes. But you better be fast at doing whatever you are doing, because I won’t be able to lie forever.»

Sherlock nodded briefly, then he stood. «Remember, Detective Inspector. No one must know.» And in a moment, he was gone.

Gregory stared at the empty armchair, not sure he actually knew what had just happened.

Sherlock was alive. Fuck. Reality finally dawned on him and he hid his face in his hands, shaking, his elbows resting on his knees.

Sherlock was alive and he had just showed up in his flat like he had just been on holiday, except he fucking hadn’t and now Lestrade had to lie to everyone he knew because he fucking promised to help him without a single world of protest. Much to his pride, he could not suppress a sob, a shaking, mourning sound that escaped his lips before he could get a grip on himself. After a while, he sighed and lowered his hands. 

He thought back to the last year of his life, to the suspension he got for involving Sherlock in his cases, the press coverage, the grief. The first months, when he actually wondered if his relationship with Mycroft would survive Sherlock’s suicide, seen how cold and detached his partner had become right after, keeping him out of his life even more than usual, refusing to see him for weeks.

Gregory stood and walked to the kitchen, fetching an old bottle of Whiskey and pouring it in a glass. He leaned against the counter, his lower back pressed against its edge, and sipped his drink slowly. His eyes fell on his mobile, still connected to the charger, and his first impulse was to call Mycroft to find comfort in his voice. He reached for the phone and stared at it for a while, then put it back on the counter behind him.

Mycroft would have sensed something was wrong as soon as he’d picked up and Greg knew he would not have been able to lie to him at that moment.

With a sigh, he finished his whiskey and went back to the living room, massaging his temples and collapsing on the sofa. How was he supposed to keep it secret from Mycroft, for God’s sake? Even without his absurd deductive abilities, they had been together for two years; Mycroft knew him better than himself. Greg swore between his teeth. “It isn’t fair,” he thought. Sherlock had nearly destroyed the lives of everyone who knew him, but he seemed not to care in the least; and now he expected him to lie to his partner and best friend just because he asked him to.

Feeling a bit nauseous and lightheaded, Greg dragged himself to his bedroom and crawled under the duvet, half-hoping that in the morning he would wake up and realize that it had just been a dream. Or a nightmare.

* * *

 

_2 months later_

Detective Inspector Lestrade closed the folder on his desk with an annoyed gesture, longing desperately for a cup of coffee. His current case was harder than usual and he was starting to despair he would ever solve it. It was in moments like that that he missed having Sherlock as a consultant. A knock on the door distracted him from his auto-commiseration and he lifted his eyes to find Donovan observing him, a yellow folder in her hands.

He gestured her to come in and she complied, closing the door behind her.

«How’s the case going?» she asked sympathetically.

Greg shook his head. «It’s not going at all. We are stuck until we get back the forensic report.»

She hummed in understanding. «Well, I thought you might want to know I closed the suicides case. Again. With sound evidence that Sherlock could not have been involved anyhow.  Exactly as you requested.» She added the last part of the sentence with a slightly irritated tone.

«You did?» asked Greg rhetorically, suddenly attentive.

She rolled her eyes. «Yes, sir.»

He smiled at her gratefully and nodded towards the folder that was resting on her lap. «You can leave it here, then. I’ll have a look at it when I get home, but I’m sure you did a great job.»

She smiled a little in return. «I’m gonna start with the bomber one tomorrow, then.»

Greg nodded again in acknowledgement. «Thank you, Sally. You’re saving my life.» And indeed she was. He was having enough trouble keeping what he was doing secret from Mycroft as it was; he could not imagine how hard it would be if he’d had to do it on his own.

Sally placed the folder on top of a high pile of documents that still had to be processed and stood to leave, only to sit down again immediately as if she had suddenly changed her mind. «Greg,» she said tentatively. He looked at her, a bit surprised.

«Why are we doing this?»

He tried to keep his face neutral, fixing his eyes on a spot behind her left ear. «We risked our careers when Sherlock killed himself and his involvement with us became a matter of public knowledge. I just want to make sure there is no chance that some of the criminals we got into jail because of his help might escape justice for a bureaucratic quibble.»

She gave him a sceptical look. «You do realize that if someone wanted to make an appeal against their verdict they would already have done it, don’t you? It’s been more than a year. Why are we doing it now?»

Greg swore to himself. He should have thought of a better excuse. «Because we didn’t have the time before?» he tried, sounding unconvincing even to his ears.

She sighed, shaking her head. «Don’t insult my intelligence, Greg. We still don’t have the time, for all that matters. I’m using my lunch pauses to do it and you are losing hours of sleep to double-check my work. So I’ll ask again: why are we doing this now?»

«Listen, Sally, I have my reasons, OK? I can’t tell you why, not yet, but you have to trust me on this.» Greg could feel her close in on him like a vulture circling in the sky and analyzing its prey.

«Not yet? Then when? And why bother to reinstate a dead person’s name at all...?» her voice faded as her eyes lighted up in realization. «Oh my God,» she stammered, leaning heavily on the backrest. «Oh my God, he is alive, isn’t he? That damned tosser!» She almost shouted the final part of the sentence, making Greg flinch.

«Sally,» he warned.

«Don’t you dare lie to me. Is he alive?»

Greg sighed in resignation and nodded, unable to bear her piercing gaze.

«Oh my god,» she repeated, seeming at a loss of words due to the shock or the fury. Possibly both.

«Sally, no one can know. I shouldn’t have told you in the first place. He will be in danger, _we_ will be in danger if anyone finds out. Do you understand me?» Greg said hurriedly.

She nodded briefly, apparently regaining control of her emotions. A determined light shone in her eyes.

«Well, I am glad I’ll get the chance to make it up to him when he’ll be back, at least.»

 

Greg nodded in understanding; much as she’d loathed the man, Sally had not taken Sherlock’s suicide well - even if he wondered what Sherlock’s reaction would be if she actually apologized openly to him for doubting him. «Now go home, Sally. You did more than enough for one day,» he said, and he really hoped that his sergeant did not notice the slightly bitter undertone in his voice. 

* * *

 

Greg closed the front door behind him and placed his keys on the fancy keys hanger, shook off his coat and tossed it on the leather sofa to his left together with a couple of yellowish folders from his last case. He walked under the arc on the right and entered the shining kitchen, dragging himself to the fridge and fishing out some leftovers, his soles screeching against the wooden floor. Greg sighed as he sat down on a high stool at the kitchen counter, glad to finally be in a welcoming place. It was eleven p.m. and he was positively wretched. He eventually had gotten back the forensic reports for his current case and he had spent the last five hours chasing a suspect through what had seemed to be the whole city, finally catching up with him in a fucking tube station. The idiot had managed to jump on a train, forcing the Police to block the Circle line, which in turn resulted in twenty-four hostages and a potential disastrous situation. Out of sheer luck, one of the commuters was a kung fu teacher with a bad temper and a cunning mind and had knocked down the suspect while he was threatening a young woman with a knife, putting a stop to his runaway.

The man’s unhappy choice of fleeing from the police and taking civilian hostages had given Greg enough leverage to scare the shit out of him, threatening him with a life sentence, and after fifteen very intense minutes of questioning, he had a full confession signed and a murderer in jail.

Not that it made him feel any better. He was aware that he could have handled the case a lot better, but lately he had had trouble focusing – and the sleepless nights spent on Sherlock’s cases, together with the emotional stress the whole situation had caused, were the major reason for it. Greg realized he had been fiddling with his curry rice, smearing it all around the dish without really eating it, and he sighed again before taking a mouthful of it.

«Hello.»

Greg jumped startled, almost chocking on the rice. Coughing, he looked up at Mycroft, who had moved quickly from the archway and was now patting him apologetically on the back.

«What are you doing here?» he asked when he managed to catch his breath.

Mycroft smiled slightly. «Well, it _is_ my home, after all.»

Greg felt himself blushing. «Yeah, I know. I just meant that I didn’t hear you come in,» he said, looking away from his partner, embarrassed of being caught by surprise.

«I didn’t want to scare you, I apologize,» replied Mycroft taking in Gregory’s wretched state. «Long day?»

Greg snorted. «That’s an understatement.»

«Case?»

«Yeah.»

«Do you want to talk about it?» asked Mycroft wearily, conscious that Gregory could be touchy when it came to his cases.

Greg shrugged his shoulders, a miserable expression on his face. «It’s just that I know that I could have handled it better, and because of my incompetence today twenty-four people’s lives were put at stake and a civilian had to knock down the suspect to save a girl.»

Mycroft surrounded him in a loose hug from behind, resting his chin on Gregory’s left shoulder.

«You are not infallible, Gregory,» he said softly. «We all make mistakes; we just have to learn to live with them.»

Greg leaned against Mycroft’s chest, sighing. He had decided to go back to Mycroft’s house instead of his own flat because he had needed some reassurance, some comfort from the only person in his life that seemed to fully understand him. He knew he was being selfish – in the last two months he had found all sorts of excuses to avoid seeing him too often, hoping that Mycroft would not find out what he was hiding from him- but he could not help missing him and hating himself a little bit more every time he turned down his partner’s offers. Greg knew that Mycroft had noticed the change and was dreading the day he would call a stop to it, demanding an explanation, but for the time being Mycroft seemed to wearily accept it. Greg could not help feeling overwhelmed by the trust Mycroft showed to have in him, but he could not avoid thinking of how disappointed in him he was going to be when he’d found out that Sherlock was alive and that he knew all along.

«What’s wrong?» asked Mycroft sensing him going tense against his body.

«Nothing,» lied Greg tiredly, trying to relax again and ignore the guilt he felt.

 Mycroft decided to let the lie pass, as he did too often of late. He could not understand what was happening with Gregory; he feared he was trying to find a nice way to break up with him, even if he could not understand why. His behaviour would suggest so, if it were not for the nights when Greg showed up at his home without telling him and just leaned on him –and not only in a physical way.

Something was bothering his partner and Mycroft did not know how to find out what without using his typical means, which he knew Gregory despised deeply. Not wanting to risk worsening the situation, he had refrained himself from investigating so far, but he was not sure he could stand it for a lot longer. Sighing heavily, he squeezed Gregory’s side and stepped back. «Do you want to finish that?» he asked, nodding towards the dish. Gregory shook his head. «Then let’s go to bed.»

* * *

 

Mycroft woke up when it was still dark outside and found himself engulfed in a loose embrace, with Gregory’s arm sprawled over his chest and his face buried in his neck.

He smiled softly, revelling in the warmth of his partner’s body, and he snuggled closer, trying to go back to sleep. After twenty minutes, he gave up with a sigh. Moving carefully, he extracted himself from under Gregory and got out of bed, tucking the duvet back around his sleeping partner.

He looked at him pensively for a moment, then padded silently out of the bedroom, fetching his nightgown on his way out. He headed for the kitchen, turning on the kettle and making himself a cup of tea. He then moved to the sitting room, picking up a book from the coffee table and sitting on the sofa. He glared at Gregory’s coat, sprawled on the right armrest in a messy way. He never cared to hang it up, no matter how many times Mycroft asked him to.

He was already turning his attention to the book when his eyes caught a glimpse of something unexpected. Mycroft frowned, reaching for the yellow folders lying on the sofa, half-covered by the coat. Gregory never brought his cases to Mycroft’s home; he must have decided to come to his place when he had already left New Scotland Yard.

Mycroft hesitated for a moment, torn between curiosity and his partner’s privacy, then opened the first folder.

As he suspected, it was from Gregory’s current case, the one that ended with the kung fu guy knocking the suspect out. He scrolled past the reports and depositions and frowned a little bit more; Gregory had been right saying that he could have handled it better. He had missed some key clues at the very beginning and lost a remarkable amount of time waiting for the forensic report.

Mycroft closed the first folder and opened the second one, looking for the final confession and the depositions of the hostages. His eyebrows raised in puzzlement. He stared at the documents in his hands, wondering why Gregory had the suicides case’s folder with him. Sherlock had closed it ages ago and the killer was dead, anyway. He studied it carefully, reading through the first report. Everything seemed right. Then his eyes fell on the date of the last one. It was the day before. The signature was Sergeant Donovan’s.

He went through all the other ones, just to make sure he was not mistaken, but it was pretty clear what Gregory was making Donovan do. He focused on the last document. It was a bunch of depositions from various witnesses, all giving Sherlock an alibi for each of the murders, followed by a thick document with Sherlock’s banking movements and phone records, all proving that there had not been any contacts between the killer and Sherlock himself before the night the case was solved. It was neat work, he had to admit, but Mycroft could not understand why Gregory and his team were going through Sherlock’s old case after more than a year.

And then it hit him. Gregory’s detached behaviour, all the excuses to avoid him, his tiredness. He was hiding that he was going through his brother’s old cases because he feared Mycroft would understand why. And there was only one possible reason for him to do so. Someone had asked him to and Mycroft had a feeling he knew exactly who this person was. Closing the folder and putting it aside, he reached for his mobile and dialed a number. 

The man at the other side of the line picked up after four rings and Mycroft uttered a single word full of barely restrained rage.

«Sherlock.»

* * *

 

Greg woke up with a fluffy cloud of duvet surrounding him, either meaning that Mycroft had already woken up and left the bed or that he was freezing beside him, having been robbed of his part of the thick blanket. He yawned loudly and tentatively extracted his head from under the duvet, just to find his partner sitting up next to him, a book resting in his lap, watching him tenderly. Greg felt his heart clench and a wave of self-hatred made his throat tighten. It must have been clear from his expression, because Mycroft’s changed rapidly to one of resignation. He put the book aside, then laid down next to him over the duvet.

«Gregory...» he said, hesitantly. «I saw your case folders downstairs.»

Gregory looked back at him blankly.

Mycroft was a little taken aback from his lack of reaction. «I _read_ them,» he clarified.

Gregory lifted his eyebrows, not understanding what Mycroft was trying to say. «Well, it’s not like you didn’t know already what this case was about.»

«Gregory, there was also a folder with the suicides case documentation.»

Greg froze. He must have picked it up by mistake when he left his office. Damn, Sally had left it on the stack on his desk, exactly where his current case’s folders were. Shit. He looked at Mycroft, trying to understand how much he had deduced, but before he could decide what to say, Mycroft spoke again.

«I owe you an apology, Gregory. A serious one. But I beg you to believe me when I say that it was all done to keep you safe.»

Greg stared back at him, confused again. That should have been his line, shouldn’t it? «What?»

Mycroft sighed. « I do know that my brother is alive. I am the one who helped him fake his death.»

Greg blinked, dumbfounded. It took almost a minute before he found his voice again. «You knew -- You knew it all along?»

Mycroft nodded. «It was necessary. But I did not know that my dear brother had involved you, too.»

Gregory could not wrap his mind around it. It didn’t make any sense. «But he made me promise to keep it secret. Why didn’t he tell me you knew?»

Mycroft looked away, sighing. «My role in Sherlock’s downfall was not irrelevant, Gregory, and Sherlock is not a forgiving person. He saw the chance and took his revenge. Of course, he did not consider the pain he inflicted to you while trying to hurt me.»

Greg leaned his head on his palm, rising from the pillow, and stared at him in disbelief. «Let me get this straight. You are trying to tell me that Sherlock made me promise not to tell anybody I knew he was alive and somehow _forgot_ to exclude you from the list of those who didn’t have to know because he was pissed at you?»

«He had a good reason,» admitted Mycroft, frowning at the pang of guilt he felt as he remembered how he had sold Sherlock’s life to Moriarty.

«Yeah, and I have a fucking good reason to kill him as soon as he gets back from the dead,» groaned Greg, collapsing back on the pillow.

«That would be most counterproductive, my dear,» said Mycroft, restraining himself from reaching out and caressing his partner’s cheek.

Greg eyed him warily. «How mad are you at me?»

Mycroft shifted closer to him. «I am not mad at you. You did what you thought was right and you kept a promise. I cannot be mad at you for being a good man, Gregory. I am simply relieved that all this farce is over. At some point, I thought you wanted to break up with me,» he admitted, averting his eyes.

Greg let out a shuddering sigh, then reached out to him from under the duvet and grabbed his arm tightly. «I would never, Mycroft. Never,» he said, staring decisively into his eyes.

Mycroft’s relieved smile could have enlightened the night, seen how bright it was. Lying down, he pulled on the duvet until it covered both of their bodies, then shifted until his back was flushed against Gregory’s chest.

Gregory placed a feathery kiss on his nape and hugged him tight, dragging him even closer.

«Thank you,» whispered Mycroft just before they fell asleep again, both finally smiling again.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.  
> If you find any mistakes don't hesitate to let me know.


End file.
